Garhwal, April - May 2007

Six birders - some green, some brown, others a primed yellow - made a trek to the Garhwal Himalaya in April 2007. I, who used to consider myself one of the primed yellow category, found myself so clueless at times that I became a birder of many colours. An account of that trek - as a travel piece, not a birding trip - has been published on Rediff.com (first in India Abroad's travel special). Here is the link

Cloud 9 - Good news from Borneo

(Image: copyright BBC)

Wonderful news for cat lovers. If you like cats of all sizes, that is.

Camera traps have revealed the presence of the rare Bornean clouded leopard in Sebangua National Park, an area where the animals not been recorded before. This is particularly exciting given that recent studies have indicated that the clouded leopard found on the island is a separate species.

Borneo, as Eric Hansen wrote about in Stranger in the Forest, is a treasure chest of biodiversity. Previously, camera traps revealed the presence of a mammal unknown to science in these forests.

Due to the isolation of the island, most Bornean fauna has been little studied and new research has revealed some amazing new finds: the Asiatic Elephant found in Borneo is a separate subspecies and a new population of apes has been discovered on the island.

Borneo’s forests, described as a hotbed for new species are threatened by massive logging that, if unchecked, may wipe out most of its endemic wildlife.

(All links - BBC)

The Walrus, minus the carpenter

Here's an endearing portrait of that wonderful, little known and oft-misunderstood fatso of the Arctic pack ice known as the Walrus. Natalie Angier in NYT: In the public pantheon of marine mammaldom, dolphins are adored, whales revered, and seal pups make old Bond girls swoon. But walruses remain perversely, lumpishly obscure, known mostly for their sing-song linkage with a carpenter, an eggman and goo goo goo joob. To which Dr. Schusterman and his colleagues might well respond with a blast of a Bronx kazoo. Odobenus rosmarus is a magnificent creature, they say, behaviorally, anatomically, acoustically and taxonomically in a category all its own. More

American warbling with GS

Envy is a dish best served lukewarm. And it is with immeasurable helpings of that emotion that I serve you Gopi Sundar's fantastic photographic essay on a birding trip to see North American warblers in springtime. The good news is that Gopi is back in India. The bad news is that I'm not sure if this post was his swan... er... warbler song on this blog. More here